


Drabbles from Across the Void

by gallifreyburning



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-18
Updated: 2013-05-18
Packaged: 2017-12-12 04:29:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/807237
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gallifreyburning/pseuds/gallifreyburning
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A series of vignettes about Rose and the metacrisis Doctor in Pete's Universe.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Drabbles from Across the Void

Rose came to the gala because it meant something to Pete, and even after the kind of day she’d had at Torchwood, she didn’t want to let him down. He was really good at this CEO stuff, being the public face of Vitex and running everything behind the scenes, and she didn’t know exactly when it happened but in her head he’d stopped being the  _other_ Pete and just started being  _Pete._ He would’ve understood if she bailed, but she put on her black dress and came anyway.

Once they’d been ushered to their table, though, Rose could hardly sit up straight. She’d only just washed off the slime from the alien they’d rounded up and herded off-planet, and she could still smell it on herself, even if the Doctor promised it was all gone. She’d told the Doctor she was fine, smiled and posed for the roving photographers, but he saw through her bluster. He always did. 

During dinner his hand rested on the back of her neck as they listened to board member after board member give speeches, his thumb rubbing small circles over her sore muscles. He waved over the waiter every time her water glass was empty ( _It’s important to hydrate after being exposed to Muntrake bile, Rose,_ he murmured, and she leaned back against his shoulder, tucking into his side as he put his arm around her). He asked for an extra serving of the chocolate-banana mousse and let her eat half of it ( _Oh quit complaining,_ he whispered into her hair, lifting the fork to her lips, and this once she did what he asked because it was really quite delicious, and his fingers were warm where they cupped her opposite elbow, and  _he_  didn’t smell like Muntrake bile, he smelled like clean skin and aftershave and _Doctor_ ).

On the way out of the building, when they were finally headed to the car, she didn’t bother trying to walk upright by herself. He was a tall anchor, his arm steady across her back and waist, his grin unfailing toward the camera even as she only managed a tired smirk. He was saying things to the photographers, praising Pete and Vitex and using all the right words for the press ( _for once_ ) until they were in the back of the limo Jackie had arranged for them. 

Rose sighed deeply as the limo pulled into traffic, tucking her face into the crook of his neck and curling her legs across his lap as he took her in his arms. He was talking, just like always, telling her about a species born without eyes,  _but they developed a recording device to embed in their brains at birth, so they’re walking cameras, Rose, and they consider it the highest form of flattery to take a picture of someone else, because it means dedicating memory storage. Isn’t that funny? A finite brain, and they dedicate a bit of that brain to another one of their species by taking their picture._  

And as she closed her eyes and melted against the lean length of his body, his voice humming against her ear and her hand resting over the steady beat of his one heart, she thought about how she was so very good at being in charge and taking care of everything, but sometimes —  _often_  — letting the Doctor take care of her was the best of all.

* * *

Tony Tyler was an imaginative child, prone to fits of obsession. Jackie swore up and down she didn’t know where he got it from, but she suffered his phases with remarkable patience. When he was a dinosaur, she dutifully called him  _Rex_  instead of _Tony_  and allowed him to stalk his macaroni and cheese all the way from the living room to the kitchen. When he was a fireman, she gave up scolding him every time he used his watergun to extinguish her scented candles and let him wear his plastic fire-helmet every afternoon when they ran errands.

So when Tony read his first  _Superman_  comic, it was no surprise he immediately plunged right into the mythos. Except to everyone’s surprise, Tony didn’t tie a towel around his shoulders and try to jump off the back of the couch. Instead, he fetched his camera and one of Pete’s fedoras and insisted that Jackie take him to the store “for more supplies.”

The next day, Tony presented the Doctor with a box, badly-wrapped in newspaper and decorated with a rubber lizard instead of a bow. Inside was a blue t-shirt emblazoned with the Superman sigil.

“I don’t know about your secret identity,” Tony said with a grave nod.

A grin spread across the Doctor’s face, and his eyebrows arched nearly to his hairline. “Is that so, Tony?”

“My name’s not Tony, it’s Jimmy,” Tony corrected with a shake of his head.

The Doctor took to wearing the Superman shirt beneath his button-down at all times. “In case of emergency,” he explained to Rose with a shrug, as he put it in the washing machine for the third time in one week. And each Wednesday when he and Rose came to the mansion for family supper, Tony dragged him into the backyard as soon as the plates were cleared. They’d disappear for the rest of the evening, the flash on Tony’s little plastic camera like a homing beacon alerting everyone else to the Doctor’s location. In those hours, Superman and Jimmy Olsen rescued baby squirrels from General Zod and foiled Brainaic’s elaborate plots to rule the world by means of the untrimmed shrubbery at the far end of the Tyler property.

Then, one Saturday, the Doctor showed up at the mansion with a large duffel bag. Jackie let him in and he disappeared with Tony into the backyard, as usual. Five hours later, Jackie finally went outside to see what was keeping the boys so very quiet and occupied.

She found them behind Brainiac’s shrubbery, along with an elaborate, humming metal contraption. Both Superman and Jimmy Olsen stared at Jackie with wide eyes, but before either of them could say anything, Jackie held up her hand for silence.

“What does it do?” she snapped at the Doctor.

He opened his mouth for a moment and no words came out, as though he was trying to decide whether a hail of nonsensical chatter or the truth would deflect Jackie’s wrath. “An antigravity machine,” he said in defeat.

Jackie nodded crisply and gestured at the contraption. “Torchwood property, I’m assuming?”

“Bits and pieces,” the Doctor said, glancing at Tony.

“Right,” she snapped. “Both of you, inside. I’m calling Pete and Rose.” With slumped shoulders and pouts, the boys both complied.

The incident hardly put a damper on their superhero antics, however. From then on, they simply refered to Jackie as “Lex Luthor.” 

* * *

When the skinny man in blue and red pinstripes walks in the door of the pub, he seems lost for a moment – eyes swiveling back and forth as he surveys the crowd, looking for something. Sitting at the bar with a drink, Rose waits until he spots her.

The corners of his mouth twitch, and he reaches up unconsciously to rub at his wild brown hair. With a smirk at Rose, he makes a beeline to the other side of the pub, to a contentious darts game. Within seconds he manages to interpose himself between the players and the board, and he drinks one of their beers while hijacking the game and the conversation. Before the round’s over, they’ve ordered the Doctor another drink, and he’s flinging darts at the wall with terrifying gusto, and Rose isn’t watching him – she really isn’t – he just happens to be in her peripheral vision, while this blond bloke on the stool next to her chats her up.

After the darts are all permanently lodged in the wooden paneling, and the players have begged him to come along to the next pub with them – they’re in for an epic crawl tonight, apparently – the pinstriped bloke leaves them and sidles up on the opposite side of Rose.

It’s like she can feel warmth radiating off of him as he leans forward (and toward her, she notices), beckoning the bartender.

“I’ll have what she’s having,” he says, nodding toward the drink in Rose’s hand. It’s something the blond bloke bought for her a minute ago, in spite of her protestations that she didn’t want anything.

The blond bloke shoots a dark look at him across the top of Rose’s head. Rose swivels around to face the pinstriped man just as the bartender deposits an appletini in front of him. He lifts it to his nose and sniffs, lifts his eyebrows with a shrug, and knocks it all back in one long gulp.

The martini glass clatters to the bar, and the bloke doubles over, clutching his throat and making choking noises. Stomach fluttering, instinct kicking in, Rose hops down behind him, laces her arms around his waist, and executes the Heimlich maneuver.

A thin slice of apple – garnish from the drink – pops right out of his mouth.

“Oh my god,” Rose says, “are you okay?”

“Fine,” he wheezes, but he’s not – his face is still red, he’s panting for breath and holding his sternum where she’d thumped him hard. “Perfectly fine. That was some quick thinking.”

“Never seen anyone chug an apple slice before.” The corners of his mouth curl upward as she continues, “It’s the manliest way to drink an appletini, I’d imagine.”

“That’s me,” he replies, sitting up straight and facing her, finally. “Manly as manly can be. I’ve got hairs here, see?” He waves the back of his hand in front of her face. “Doesn’t get much manlier than that. I’m Fartam, by the way. Fartamalus Ming Shufflebotham the Fourth, but it would take up half my life if everyone said that every time, so my friends just say Fartam. Sometimes Farty, if they’re in a hurry. It’s quite thoughtful of them, really.”

Rose can’t help the small snort that she makes, or the way her body starts to shake as she tries to stifle her laughter. “Right. Hallo, Farty. My name’s Adeline Louisa Maria Horsey de Horsey. My family’s French. But my friends just call me Adeline Louisa Maria.”

“It’s a pleasure,  Adeline Louisa Maria,” Farty says. “You just saved my life, it seems proper I should at least buy you a drink.” He pauses. “I can, can’t I?”

Grinning, Rose settles back onto the stool beside him. The blond bloke is gone; she hasn’t given him a second thought. “That sounds lovely.”

Three hours, four drinks, a slow dance, and a handsy taxi ride later, the two of them are sprawled naked on the living room floor of Rose’s flat.

“Oh, that was brilliant,” he says, satisfaction etched on every line of his body. Rose giggles against his shoulder, stretching her thigh across his hips and pointing her toes at the opposite side of the room. “What was that called again?”

“Role playing,” Rose replies, opening her lips and scraping her teeth across his skin. “You make a dashing Farty, by the way.”

“It is rather dashing, isn’t it? I could make the switch permanent,” he replies, looking down at her and waggling his eyebrows. “Then if we ever do like your mum wants, and get married, you could be Ms. Fartamalus Ming Shufflebotham the Fourth!”

“Mmm, Ms. Shufflebotham. I like the sound of that.”

“It’s done, then,” he says, suddenly on the move. Before she knows what’s happening, she’s on her back, pinned against the carpet. “No more Doctor. New new man, new new single heart, new new name. Fartamalus Ming Shufflebotham the Fourth, it is!”

Before Rose can protest, he covers her mouth with his own, and his hands slide down her waist and between her thighs, and even if she’d had any sort of objection to give, it’s long gone. 

For the next three weeks, the Doctor introduces himself as Fartamalus to every single person they meet.

* * *

“You should take up photography,” Rose had said, because the Doctor always needed something technological to fiddle with, and a camera seemed like a good idea.

Pete bought him a high-end SLR with every last bell and whistle, but two days later the Doctor came home from the second-hand shop, beaming, an ancient, nonfunctional Polariod camera in-hand. He set to work getting the camera in working order and hoarded Rose’s laptop for days, researching everything from the aesthetics of photographic composition to developing his own negatives. 

He cornered her in the kitchen one morning before she went to work. “Today’s the day, Rose! Photography day! We’re going to start with a short session; I’ll set up the lighting and everything while you’re away and when you come home —” He waggles his eyebrows, bouncing on his toes like a boy on Christmas morning.

When she gets home from work, the living room is unrecognizable. There’s a horrifically cheesy matte painting of an forest, complete with a waterfall and stone bridge in the background. There are paper mache boulders and lights ( _she doesn’t want to know where they came from, oh god did he spend his day making a paper mache boulder? Really?_ ).

She has stepped into the photography studio of her childhood nightmares, the ones Jackie used to make her go to every year so they could have “nice” pictures to send to her grandparents.  _Tilt your head to the right, tilt it a bit more, put your hand on your forearm, now smile._

“It’s photography time, Rose!” he says, beaming at her, bunny puppet on his right hand and Polariod in the other.

“Right,” she says, a wicked grin crossing her face. “Hold on a sec, okay? Let me just put on some nicer clothes. I didn’t realize this was going to be a  _formal_ photoshoot.”

She steps out of the bedroom ten minutes later, all smoky eyes and blood-red lipstick, lace and stockings and very little else. His jaw is on the floor and the bunny puppet makes a loud squeaking noise as he crumples it in one hand. 

“I’m ready for my close-up, Doctor,” she breathes in his ear. 

* * *

The Doctor found being half-human quite troublesome.

For starters, with only one heart and a lack of a respiratory bypass, he couldn’t run as far or fast as before. Rose occasionally outsprinted him, tugging his hand and yelling for him to keep up, while he panted and wondered if he might pass out from oxygen starvation. In his exhaustion, if he happened to trip over his own feet and fall, and Rose hugged him and kissed his scraped palms to help him feel better,  _wellll_  … there was another train in a few hours anyway, so it was all right if they’d missed this one. 

Another unfortunate side-effect: the necessity of sleep. As a Time Lord, he’d only needed a few hours a week, at most. Now he needed several hours per night. Rose seemed to enjoy curling up against him, so he really didn’t mind letting her rest in his arms. And if occasionally he happened to close his eyes, too, and leave them closed for longer than a few hours, and wake up next to her while she was all sleepy smiles, tousled hair, cat-like stretching and skimpy lingerie,  _wellll_  … not  _every_ alien invasion happened before sunrise, and sleeping in didn’t  _always_  mean the end of the world.

His half-human skin was also much warmer than that of a Time Lord. So much so, he’d been convinced he had a fever and woke up in a hot sweat every night for weeks. Rose finally suggested he sleep without jimjams on, to help stay cool and  _wellll_  … who was he to argue with sound logic, especially when it was Rose’s 400-thread-count Egyptian cotton sheets he’d be keeping clean? 

Last but not least, there was the matter of hormones. Before the metacrisis, he’d had precise control over his endocrine system. But this half-human version was flat-out unruly. No matter how much the Doctor tried, he could  _not_  coax his thyroid to produce more triidothyronine, which meant his metabolism slowed to a crawl and he put on ten pounds in his first few weeks in Pete’s world. He had to stop sampling all the catered nibbles at Vitex fundraisers and  _wellll_ … Rose didn’t seem to mind a few extra pounds on him anyway, because every Saturday she made his favorite cupcakes, the ones sprinkled with edible ball bearings.

On the opposite end of the endocrine system problem, the slightest stimulus could trigger a willy-nilly release of hormones. Like the time Jackie brandished a pair of hair clippers and said something about a haircut, and the Doctor’s body flooded with noradrenaline. He went straight into fight-or-flight mode, dashing right out the back door of the mansion and into the woods. Rose tracked him down and told him that Jackie only meant to use the clippers on Tony, and  _wellll_ … Rose was beautiful when she was feeling protective, laughing and stroking his hair and promising she wouldn’t let her mother near his glorious locks even if she had to throw the clippers into the swimming pool.

Rose’s comforting embrace led to an entirely  _different_ kind of hormonal release. Endorphin and testosterone and he lost track after that, because his body was having _another_  physical reaction his half-human self couldn’t control. And he certainly couldn’t hide it when she was sitting on his lap like that. And  _welllll_ … a bit of outdoor exertion was good for humans, the Doctor had been told. Rose quite thoroughly agreed.

* * *

The Doctor opened his eyes to find Rose’s face mere inches from his. Nibbling her thumbnail thoughtfully, she stared at him. He wondered how long she’d been watching him sleep _._  It was strange enough that he’d slept at all — being part human had its downsides, and dozing away half his remaining life was certainly one of them. 

“Good morning,” he said, swallowing a yawn. He wasn’t sure how to interpret the expression on her face, if that intense stare boded good or ill. If it meant second thoughts about the words they’d said last night, or the thing that followed. Well, the four things. Four things and the chocolate syrup.

 _Maybe she’s upset about the ruined sheets._  

He was gathering the momentum to say something — to deflect her misgivings with a hail of nonsensical chatter, to let her know it was all right and they could return to the way things were before the words and the chocolate syrup, that they could back off this path and never step down it again — when she broke the silence.

“It’s  _really_  you.” Eight months since the TARDIS disappeared from Bad Wolf bay, and Rose spoke those words as though they’d only just grown comfortable inside her head. The innerworkings of Rose Tyler’s mind were a mystery to the Doctor. He liked it that way, if he was being honest. 

“I’m still me,” he said, all seriousness. The exact same reassurance he’d given her long ago, just after he lost his short dark hair and big ears. “Very first word I ever said to you, trapped in that cellar, surrounded by shop window dummies — oh such a long time ago.” He reached out and took her fingers from her mouth, lacing them with his own. “I took your hand, and I said one word. Just one word I said, ‘Run.’”

His words had the intended effect. She smiled — beamed, actually. Pulled him close, embraced him so they pressed chest-to-chest. The Doctor could hardly breathe, with her so close and so very naked. 

Breath warm in his ear, she murmured, “Do you feel that, Doctor? Just there, on the right side of your chest.” 

Her heart beating against his flesh, thrumming away just like the second heart he was missing in this human body. He couldn’t speak. Every part of his mind and body was focused on that strong, steady thrumming. He wasn’t lopsided anymore; Rose Tyler was the balance that made him whole. 

“I feel it,” he said, the words unsteady, laden with a flood of emotions he couldn’t begin to speak aloud.

“Good. Because that heart beating away in there, it’s not going anywhere. It’s yours. All right?”

Words failed him. His eyelids fluttered shut, closing against tears, and he kissed her. 

 


End file.
